Dallas Stars Blog

James Neal receives 2-game suspension

The league has announced it. James Neal has been suspended two games for his hit on Columbus forward Derek Dorsett Thursday night.

This is bad for the Stars on a couple of levels.

1. Neal is probably their best player right now and has 11 goals and 22 points through 19 games, so it obviously hurts the team to have him out of the lineup.

2. He is a player at age 22 who now has a record, and we have seen that the league treats players who have records differently than others. “Repeat offender” will be on his resume for any future hits.

The league just had meetings about dangerous play and hits to the head, and this was a very visible injury, and I think that had to factor into the decision. The league is sending a message to everyone that any kind of dangerous hit won’t be tolerated.

Hopefully, they will be consistent with that going forward.

On a confusing note, I’m not sure how this is any different than the hit Philadelphia’s Mike Richards put on Florida’s David Booth back in October. Richards received a five-minute major for interference and a game misconduct penalty in that game. There was a significant injury to Booth, and Richards did not have a previous record. Richards was not suspended.

I wonder if the league is making this decision because it felt it went too light on Richards.

My guess is Warren Peters will be in Saturday against New Jersey, and if I was guessing, I would say Brenden Morrow will play left wing on a line with Brad Richards and Loui Eriksson.

The press release is on the jump:

TORONTO (November 20, 2009) – Dallas Stars’ forward James Neal has been suspended for two games, without pay, for delivering a hit from behind that caused injury to Derek Dorsett of the Columbus Blue Jackets in NHL game #304, November 19, the National Hockey League announced today.

Under the terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, and based on his average annual salary, Neal will forfeit $8,515.00. The money goes to the Players’ Emergency Assistance Fund.

The incident occurred at 13:01 of the second period and Neal was assessed a major penalty for boarding and a game misconduct.